1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process for producing a cheese-like food which contains the total ingredients of soy-beans, and intends to provide a cheese-like food which is free from soy-bean odor and excellent in taste and texture.
2. Description of Prior Art
So far various methods have been proposed for producing so-called soy-bean cheese using soy-beans as raw material. In fact, however, the essential ingredient was soy-bean protein curd which was obtained from the whole soy-beans by removing extra materials. But the product was unsuited to practical use for food because of the remaining soy-bean odor and other properties inferior to those of natural cheese such as emulsion stability, melting property and the color.
During their investigations the present inventors found (1) that a soy-bean steep liquor, produced in the same way as corn steep liquor, and a residual liquor that occurred when "tofu" (a favorite Japanese food prepared from soy-bean) was precipitated from bean milk by using a coagulator contained some ingredients which were very effective for the growth of microorganisms; and (2) that the solid matter called "okara" in the remainder of the squeezed soy-beans favorably affected the emulsion stability, with which soy-bean protein was concerned, so as to avoid separation of the oily components, even on heating or standing. Conventionally it has been believed that the residual liquor causes the soy-bean odor and the presence of "okara" is not favorable to produce a good texture. To the contrary, the present inventors attempted to utilize these components.